Bill Maher presents himself as someone who courageously offers viewers the unvarnished truth. The “About” page for his YouTube channel describes the host of HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher as “irrepressible, opinionated, and of course, politically incorrect.” A sympathetic 2016 profile commended his authoritativeness in challenging the “feast of hypocrisy” that defines contemporary American life, going on to note his fearless willingness to call out “politicians, religious leaders, demagogues, pundits — some of them, notably, his own guests” with a trademark brand of humor “at once engaged and world-weary, and not infrequently infused with snark.”

Needless to say, this posture of searing irreverence seemed entirely absent during Maher’s roughly twenty-minute Saturday night sit-down with Twitter and Tesla CEO Elon Musk. Network television isn’t generally where one goes to see grillings of the wealthy and powerful. Almost by definition, the format tends to take it as axiomatic that these are people worth celebrating or at least taking seriously. Even by the servile standards of cable news infotainment, however, Maher’s prolonged drooling over one of the richest men in the world must be seen to be believed.